Male Fertility 'n' Manly Solutions...

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Wednesday, July 20, 2016

How are the little swimmers doing? Low
sperm counts or poor sperm quality are behind around a third of cases of
couples who can’t conceive. A visit to a clinic for a test can be awkward, but
a smartphone-based system lets men determine whether that’s necessary by
checking their fertility
at home.

Men often find it embarrassing to give a
semen sample at a clinic, says Yoshitomo Kobori at the Dokkyo Medical University
Koshigaya Hospital in Japan. So Kobori devised an alternative. “I thought a
smartphone microscope could be an easy way to look at problems with male
fertility,” he says.

Kobori and his colleagues came up with a
lens less than a millimetre thick that can be slotted into a plastic “jacket”.
Clipped on to the camera of a smartphone, it magnifies an image by 555 times –
perfect for looking at sperm.

To do a home test, a man would apply a
small amount of semen to a plastic sheet around five minutes after ejaculation
and press it against the microscope.

Watch them swim

The phone’s camera can then take a
3-second video clip of the sperm. When viewed enlarged on a computer screen, it
is easy for someone to count the total number of sperm and the number that are
moving – key indicators of fertility.

Kobori says the system works as well as
the software used in fertility clinics. When the team ran 50 samples through
both systems, they got almost identical results. The work was presented at the
European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology meeting in Helsinki this
month.

The system can’t assess the ability of
sperm to fertilise an egg. “This method is only the simple version of semen
analysis,” says Kobori. But that could be enough for men to identify potential
fertility problems, and decide whether to seek help from a doctor.

Little Xavier
Powell has been dubbed the world’s oldest baby after he was born from sperm
that was harvested nearly 23 years ago.

The baby boy
recently received the title from the Guinness World Book of Records, which said
that he was conceived at a fertility group in Queensland, Australia, on Sept 24
last year.

According to The Mirror UK, Xavier was born on June 17 this year to
Australian couple Alex Powell and Vi Nguyen via in-vitro fertilisation (IVF).

When he was
15 years old, Mr Powell was diagnosed with a rare type of cancer that affects
the lymphatic system – Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Although he
was only a teenager at the time, his stepmother had advised him to freeze his
sperm before undergoing chemotherapy.

Sperm cells
can be easily damaged by chemotherapy as it kills cells that divide rapidly, an
article by the American Cancer Society explains.

The treatment
may also reduce the number of sperm cells, reduce their quality, and cause the
cancer patient to suffer from infertility.

After what Mr
Powell described as “an awkward session” at the sperm bank, a sample of his
semen remained frozen in the facility for over two decades.

He
subsequently made a full recovery from cancer and later met his wife.

The couple
decided to have a child through IVF in late 2013, and spent nearly a year as
well as half of the frozen sperm before getting pregnant with Xavier.

On his son’s
birth, Mr Powell said in an interview with 9News: “For me, it’s that sort of
feeling in life you want to relive every moment if you can.”

He added that
they might try for a second child using the same method.

Meanwhile, a
baby girl born in the United States in 2009 is believed to have been the
titleholder of ‘World’s oldest baby’ before Xavier’s arrival.

ABC News
reported that she was born 22 years after her father Chris Biblis froze his
sperm while battling leukaemia in 1986.

According to
medical experts, sperm frozen at -196 degrees Celsius can be stored and used
after an indefinite period of time.

In a report
by The Guardian UK, Alan Pacey, an andrologist at Sheffield University
elaborated: “There’s very little happening at the cellular level. There’s no
enzymatic activity, no DNA transcription and everything metabolic is switched
off.”

Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Conflicting evidence about the extent to which men's
semen quality declines with age - likely lowering their fertility - is being
cleared up by new University of Otago research that has collated and reviewed
data from 90 previous studies from around the world.

After conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis of
the studies' data, researchers from the University's Departments of Zoology and
Anatomy found consistent age-related declines in semen volume and sperm
performance and increases in malformed and DNA-damaged sperm. Semen quality is
regarded as a proxy for how fertile a male is.

Study lead author Dr Sheri Johnson says that
understanding how age affects fertility is becoming increasingly important as
couples delay childbearing toward later stages of their lives.

"While female age is well known to have negative
effects on fertility, reproductive success and the health of offspring, the
influence of male age on a couple's fertility has been largely neglected.

"The effects of declining semen traits with
increasing male age have largely been ignored due to inconsistencies in the
literature, but our work now suggests that male age affects a variety of
traits. It is well recognised that reduced sperm performance can affect
pregnancy success, but it is less well known that the quality of the sperm,
particularly DNA quality, could affect the development and health of the
offspring," Dr Johnson says.

Dr Johnson and her co-authors synthesised the current
state of knowledge from 90 individual studies, spanning around 94,000
volunteers/patients from more than 30 countries. Their Marsden-funded study
appears in the international journal, Ageing
Research Reviews.

"Our study made no attempt to estimate the rate of
decline, but some well-controlled clinic-based studies have observed consistent
declines with increasing age, whereas others project declines after age 35 for
some traits and after age 40 for others" she says.

Professor Neil Gemmell, a co-author on the paper, says
the consistency in its findings suggests that further awareness of the
potential consequences of male age on reproductive outcomes is needed.

"Older males contribute to increased risk of
obstetric complications, miscarriage, and offspring disorders such as autism,
Down syndrome, epilepsy, and schizophrenia. In addition, increasing male
age may be an overlooked component of couple infertility,
leading to our increased use and dependency on fertility treatments, such as
IVF."

Overall, the authors advise that clinicians and the
general public need to be aware of the risks associated with male age on fertility
outcomes.

The authors suggest that clinical analysis of the
percentage of DNA-fragmented sperm cells and a greater focus on how well sperm
swim may lead to better patient outcomes during fertility treatments of ageing
couples.

"These are likely more accurate and consistent
predictors of a man's fertility status than commonly clinically measured traits
such as semen volume, sperm concentration and total sperm count," Dr
Johnson says.source: medicalnewstoday

Friday, February 28, 2014

The
issue of male infertility can leave men floundering and uncommunicative but
taking a medical and holistic approach can have astonishing results.

By Catherine Shanahan

THERE are a range of labels
and phrases around male infertility designed to kick a man when he’s down.
There’s the word ‘jaffa’, slang for an infertile man, inspired by the seedless
orange. There’s the reference to ‘shooting blanks’ and ‘bad swimmers’.

The terminology adds insult to injury for men struggling to come to terms with
the fact that their ability to father a child is either severely compromised or
downright impossible.

Thomas McCluskey, a 32-year-old security worker from Clondalkin, Co Dublin, was
beginning to think he was in the latter category after he and wife Karen, (31)
had spent five years trying to conceive.

Initially, he kept quiet about his difficulties.

“It’s not like you’d walk into the local and say to the lads ‘I’m shooting
blanks’. There’s a stigma attached,” Thomas says.

[timg]KarenThomasMcCluskeyAndBaby_large.jpg[/img]

Perfect result: Baby TJ McCluskey with parents Karen and Thomas
McCluskey.
Dr Tim Dineen, laboratory manager at Cork Fertility Centre (CFC), agrees. He
conducted a series of interviews to study the male reaction to fertility
problems while working on a masters in genetic counselling.

“When I conducted interviews for my thesis 10 years ago, male fertility was a
taboo subject and I found men were very slow to discuss it.

“My research suggested that identifying the root cause of subfertility, (a less
than normal capacity for reproduction), can help the male psychologically, in
that he may not blame himself and/ or think that he contributed to his problem.
Men may also be reassured that male factor subfertility can be overcome through
various treatment options,” Dineen says.

His research also highlighted the psychological impact of subfertility on the
man.

“Many men had feelings of disappointment, failure, anxiety and anger,
particularly when it’s something they have little control over such as a
genetic condition,” he says.

Then there was the impact of infertility on a relationship. A colleague of
Dineen’s did a study which found men can suffer low self-esteem and have high
levels of stress when a diagnosis of subfertility is made, and these feelings
can be acerbated by a lack of openness to communication. This in turn can
decrease the level of overall contentment with the marital relationship.

However, what many men did not realise, says Dineen, is that male factor
subfertility problems are not as rare as they might think.

“We see men every week who think they are the only one with this problem, but
in fact, in at least one third of all cases, subfertility can be attributed to
the male,” he says.

McCluskey was surprised when his sperm count came back on the low side after he
had it tested three years into trying for a baby. The doctor advised him to
lose weight (he was 19½ stone at the time) and to cut back on smoking (20 a
day) and drinking, (24 cans a week).

“There was some sperm there so I though I was not doing anything too wrong. The
doctor said, ‘You’re a young lad, try and cut down’, but I didn’t make too much
of an effort to change at the time,” he says.

After another year-and-a-half of trying unsuccessfully to conceive, McCluskey
went again for semen analysis, the principle investigation used to evaluate
male fertility — it measures the number of sperm, the motility, (ability to
move), and the morphology, (shape). Costs vary per clinic. At CFC the test
ranges between €75 and €125.

Thomas’ sperm count was even lower this time around, but it took a TV show to
get him motivated. He heard that TV3 were looking for a couple experiencing
difficulties conceiving for a show called How Healthy Are You?.

“I had nothing to lose by doing the show. We didn’t have money to go down the
IVF route and the show was looking at alternative therapies, so we went for
it,” Thomas says.

The alternatives included analysing diet and lifestyle and making the necessary
changes and trying out complementary therapies such as acupuncture and
hypnotherapy.

Senior clinical embryologist Declan Keane, founder of the ReproMed clinics in
Dublin and Kilkenny, was one of the show’s contributors. He’s a firm believer
in exhausting the alternatives before heading down the route of advanced
medical treatments.

“At present in Ireland, there’s no true link between those offering medical
therapies and those offering complementary or holistic therapies. There should,
in my view, be an integrated medical approach incorporating nutrition, dietary
advice, psychological advice and other holistic therapies,” he says.

Being identified as subfertile can threaten men’s core identity. Keane believes
men take infertility very personally, that it “hits the masculine or macho
side”. While Dineen believes men find it difficult to distinguish between
virility (sex drive), and fertility.

Many ask, “Am I not a real man if I can’t procreate?” he says.

CFC offers free counselling to help men deal with the psychological side.
McCluskey concedes that he was under a lot of stress. “You can get very
stressed thinking ‘I’ll never have kids’. From a male point of view you don’t
want to think that you can’t father a child,” he says.

The couple seized the opportunities the show offered, changing diet with the
help of nutritionist Elsa Jones, moving from heavily processed convenience
foods to wholesome, fresh produce. They tried acupuncture with Karen Costin, a therapy
Thomas said gave a “huge sense of relief” and hypnotherapist and
psychotherapist Aisling Killoran put him in a better mental state. “It might
seem like a lot of hocus-pocus to some people, but it’s actually quite
practical. It relaxes you and puts you in a fantastic frame of mind,” says
McCluskey.

But despite their best efforts, he got more bad news during the show. Another
semen analysis showed no sperm present whatsoever.

Was this the end of the road? Not necessarily, Dineen says.

“The good news is that it is possible for him [a man with no sperm in the
ejaculate], to still have his own biological child. We can carry out a
testicular biopsy, Testicular Sperm Extraction (TESE), to retrieve sperm from
testicular tissue; this may either be carried out on the day of ICSI treatment
or a sample may equally be frozen and stored for use at a later date.”

ICSI (Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection), one of the most popular techniques
used to overcome the problems of low sperm count and poor motility, involves
injecting a single moving sperm into the female partner’s egg, (collected for
fertilisation outside the womb and transferred back after fertilisation has
occurred).

At CFC, TESE is carried out under local anaesthetic and takes approximately 20
minutes; the clinic carries out approximately 40 procedures a year. Dineen says
this method of sperm retrieval is very successful, and sperm is retrieved from
tissue in about 80% of cases, resulting in a live birth rate of 42% per
transfer.

However for men who undergo biopsy and no sperm are recovered, they do
unfortunately hit a genetic cul de sac. “And you are then looking at options
such as use of donor sperm,” he says. Donor sperm was not an option McCluskey
had ever considered. It was suggested to him after the test where no semen was
found.

“That was stunning news. That was life-changing. When it only takes one sperm
to get pregnant, that news was devastating. I felt I had nothing to work with.”

In a panic, the couple sought more intense help from the therapists and doctors
involved in the TV3 show. Declan Keane was encouraging. “He told me it takes
three months to make sperm. I think that’s why my lifestyle changes didn’t take
immediate effect. But I didn’t now that until he told me,” says McCluskey.

In the end, he did have something to work with. On January 5, he and Karen, an
office administrator, had their first child, Thomas Jack (TJ).

Against what seemed like overwhelming odds, it was a spontaneous pregnancy. And
amid all the stress and disappointment, the manner in which McCluskey learned
he would finally become a father had its humorous side.

Karen was a week late menstruating and decided to do a pregnancy test.

McCluskey didn’t encourage her. “I said ‘Karen, we’ve been here so many times
before’.” Karen did a test anyway but didn’t hang about for the result. “She
was annoyed with me about something. She went off to work and left the
pregnancy test on top of the cistern,” he says.

Later in the bathroom, he spotted the test. A casual glance gave way to an
incredulous stare. “I’ll never forget it as long as I live. It was a massive
surprise. There were two blue lines,” he says.

McCluskey rang his wife with the news. She didn’t believe him. In the end he
had to send a photograph via his iphone. So now that he’s achieved what seemed
the impossible, (in his words “a true miracle”), what advice does he have for
other men dealing with infertility issues?

“Do your research. Don’t give up. You don’t necessarily have to go down the IVF
or ICSI route. Examine your diet and lifestyle”.

And ultimately he says ‘Get yourselves checked out’.

“When you are coming to an age where having children is on the agenda, get the
test done to see where you are on the scale.”

Sunday, February 2, 2014

Previous research has shown that what
mothers eat during pregnancy affects the health of their offspring. But now, a
new study suggests that a father's diet prior to conception could also play an
important role in their child's health, particularly when it comes to
consumption of folate.

Folate , also known as vitamin B9, is found
naturally in a broad variety of foods, including dark green leafy vegetables,
nuts, beans, peas, fruit and fruit juices, dairy products, poultry and meat,
eggs, seafood and grains.

In 1998, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
required manufacturers to add folate to enriched breads, flours, cereals,
cornmeals, pastas, rice and many other grain products, since these products are
highly consumed in the US.

The researchers, led by Sarah Kimmins of McGill
University in Canada, say that in order for mothers to help prevent
miscarriages and birth defects, it is well known that they must consume
sufficient levels of folate.

According to the Office of Dietary Supplements, a part of the National
Institutes of Health, women of childbearing age should have 400 mcg
(micrograms) of folate each day from dietary supplements and/or fortified
foods, and this increases to 600 mcg a day for pregnant women.

But the investigators note that whether a father's folate
levels play an important role in the development of their offspring has been
under-studied.

Folate deficiency linked to increased risk of birth
defects

New research has revealed that a man's diet could impact the health of his
child, and low levels of folate could significantly increase the risk of their
infant having birth defects.

To investigate this further, the research team conducted
a mouse study in which they compared offspring of fathers who had sufficient
folate levels to the offspring of fathers who had low folate levels.

Their findings, published in the journal Nature Communications, revealed that offspring of mice fathers who had
insufficient folate levels had a 30% increase in birth defects, such as
cranio-facial and spinal deformities, compared with offspring of fathers who
had adequate levels of the vitamin.

Explaining the reasons behind their findings, the
researchers note that there are areas of the sperm epigenome that are sensitive
to lifestyle choices, particularly diet. The epigenome can influence the way in
which genes are activated and how certain information is passed on to
offspring.

They say that the sperm can carry a "memory" of
a father's lifestyle choices and diet, and the information from a father's diet
is transferred to an "epigenomic map," which can influence a child's
development.

Fathers 'need to think about diet just as much as
mothers'

Sarah Kimmins says their findings suggest that fathers
need to think about what they eat, smoke and drink just as much as mothers do,
as their lifestyle choices could impact future generations.

And she notes that although folate is added
to many foods, fathers who have diets that are high in fat or who are obese may
be unable to metabolize folate in the same way as those who have sufficient
levels of the vitamin.

She adds:

"People
who live in the Canadian North or in other parts of the world where there is
food insecurity may also be particularly at risk for folate deficiency. And we
now know that this information will be passed on from the father to the embryo
with consequences that may be quite serious."

The researchers say that the next steps from this
research will be to collaborate with professionals at a fertility clinic in
order to further investigate how a man's diet and weight could impact their
child's health.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Researchers have discovered that
adding a missing protein to infertile human sperm can 'kick-start' its ability
to fertilise an egg and dramatically increase the chances of a successful
pregnancy.

The team, from Cardiff
University's School of Medicine, first found that sperm transfers a vital
protein, known as PLC-zeta (PLCz), to the egg upon fertilisation.

This sperm protein initiates a
process called "egg activation" which sets off all the biological
processes necessary for development of an embryo.

Now, the team has found that eggs
that do not fertilise because of a defective PLCz, as in some forms of male
infertility, can be treated with the active protein to produce egg activation.

The added PLCz kick-starts the
fertilisation process and significantly improves the chance of a successful
pregnancy.

It is estimated that at least
2,000 men a year seeking fertility treatment may suffer from a lack of or
damage to the PLC-zeta protein.

Professor Tony Lai, who led the
research with Professor Karl Swann, said: "We know that some men are
infertile because their sperm fail to activate eggs.

"Even though their sperm
fuses with the egg, nothing happens. These sperm may lack a proper functioning
version of PLCz, which is essential to trigger the next stage in becoming
pregnant.

"What's important from our
research is that we have used human sperm PLCz to obtain the positive results
that we had previously observed only in experiments with mice.

"In the lab we have been
able to prepare human PLCz protein that is active. If this protein is inactive
or missing from sperm, it fails to trigger the process necessary for egg
activation – the next crucial stage of embryo development.

"However, when an
unfertilised egg is injected with human PLCz, it responds exactly as it should
do at fertilisation, resulting in successful embryo development to the
blastocyst stage, vital to pregnancy success."

Professor Lai added: "We've
established that this one sperm protein, PLCz, is absolutely critical at the
point where life begins.

"Whilst this was a lab
experiment and our method could not be used in a fertility clinic in exactly
the same way – there is potential to translate this advance into humans.

"In the future, we could
produce the human PLCz protein and use it to stimulate egg activation in a
completely natural way. For those couples going through IVF treatment, it could
ultimately improve their chances of having a baby and treat male
infertility."

The research was published online
by the journal Fertility and Sterility and was funded by the Wellcome Trust.

Dr Allan Pacey, a senior lecturer
in andrology (male reproduction) at the University of Sheffield, said: "I
think this is very interesting research. It is exciting that they have got to
this stage."

He estimated that about 2,000 of
the 50,000 couples undergoing fertility treatment a year could benefit from the
discovery.

BABY FERTILE

*11 easy ways to double your sperm count in 10 weeks*:

Here, from experts, are 11 easy ways to double your sperm count in just 10 weeks:1.AVOID HEAT NEAR GENITALS.—Studies have found that raising temperatures by even one degree can inhibit sperm production. Don’t take hot baths and avoid saunas. If you visit the beach, take regular breaks from sunbathing to cool off in the sea.2.AVOID ALCOHOL. — Booze "can have a toxic effect on the testicles,” according to Dr. Geeta Nargund, Medical Director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine in London.3. WEAR LOOSE CLOTHING. — Put on boxer shorts instead of briefs. 4. GET PLENTY OF VITAMINS E & C. — Men who are vitamin E deficient tend to have malformed sperms; and vitamin C has been shown to boost sperm formation. 5. INCREASE INTAKE OF ZINC.—Zinc plays a direct roll in the growth of new sperm. Fertility experts recommend eating plenty of zinc-rich food such as seeds and nuts. 6. TAKE SELENIUM.—When given as a supplement, this mineral has been shown to double sperm production in low-count men. Brazil nuts are rich in selenium. 7. CONSUME ESSENTIAL FATTY ACIDS.—Found in oily fish such as salmon and mackerel, EFAs dramatically increase sperm quantity and quality .8. DRINK FILTERED OR BOTTLED WATER ONLY.—Tap water contains high quantities of chemicals that mimic the female hormone estrogen, which reduces male fertility. 9. TAKE BREAKS FROM SITTING.—Driving solidly for three hours a day or more has a detrimental effect on sperm counts – as does sitting at an office desk for long periods. 10. EAT NATURAL FOODS.—Pesticides can cut sperm counts, so eat organic vegetables. 11. RELAX.—Don’t put pressure on yourself. Studies have found that stress has a direct immediate effect on sperm count. So just relax and do what comes naturally.